This is a game for Chocolate Doom? Not exactly Vanilla Chocolate though...

The current name is temporary.

The idea of the game is a fantasy/scifi first person shooter game set in some sort of dream like world. There isn't going to be much of a story. The gameplay, etc will be the more important.

The story is this:"Lots of evil monsters attack. Only one person can fight back."

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Some other info & goals/etc for this project:

* 10 weapons with 1 or 2 melee, others ranged
* Somewhere around 15 - 20 enemies plus some boss enemies
* 20 - 40 single player or cooperative levels depending how big they will be
* Maybe 10 deathmatch levels depending how many people are interested
* Deathmatch levels could also be used in a mode where an endless supply of enemies will spawn into the level and player(s) needs to survive as long as possible
* There could be some other multiplayer game modes too

Yea, Combat Rifle could fit, since it's not necessarily a shotgun.. does any real shotgun actually shoot the pellets in a horizontal line pattern?

I added 3x A_Pistol into the attack, so that it fires 10 pellets. This will probably make the Super Shotgun less Super. The horizontal line is just much more accurate... Maybe they'll have about the same fire rate?

Well, it became Combat Rifle... kinda fits with the Personal Defence Weapon name for the Pistol replacement. Maybe it could also have a third word in it, thought about Advanced, but maybe the Super Shotgun should be Advanced <Some-Thing>.

Today I made some enemies. They're maybe a bit too close to the sprites. Maybe I shouldn't have looked at the Imp sprites before I started making the model. At some point, the Imp head started to look like the Arch-Vile head, so I made Arch-Vile too, and changed the Imp head less Arch-Vile head like.

some broken links here...

Tried some crappy texture on the Imp, to see if texture can make it look more different than the sprites. Maybe it's ok.

I have thought that I might use a low color graphic style, so any feedback about that would be nice.

I was thinking something like 8 to 16 colors per texture, plus/include some 2 to 4 colors for blood splats. Other than that, I wouldn't try to limit myself to a 256 color palette.. I have no idea what would be all the colors I would be using.

My thoughts about this style are that it would make it easier to have seamless textures on models. Probably it would also be faster to do them.

Do note that I was trying to make them less like the original sprites, just like the weapon models are not exact copies of the sprites, but still something that could feel like Doom. The Arch-Vile I kinda tried to make close to the sprites, just to see if I could do that..

I think the Imp is sort of mix between Doom/Doom64/Doom3 Imps. I did experiment with some spikes in the back, and some horns on the head (which made it look a bit like those imp/baron thingys in the box art), but ultimately decided it was best without any distinctive features (also less polygons).

The textures are mockups that are meant to give some idea how the different styles could look like. At the moment I could say that only the models are complete. So at some point, I need to redo the textures into the same style, which I'm now trying to decide.

I like the idea here. It makes me think of my conversation with rabidrage in this thread, discussing the divergent design evolution of different doom clones as they were developed (how Heretic took doom and went off in a different direction, hexen another, strife another, all doomlike, but all different enough that they can be called distinct games). You said you wanted a faster-paced playstyle. Is there anything else you will be doing to the gameplay design that will differentiate it from standard DooM? Changes to monster/weapon balance?

Yea, I've thought of having some alternate skins/versions for some monsters, like in my hmm.. "prototype" mods I had colored a bunch of monsters in the Green, so that I could easily have Brown, Green, Red and Grey versions of them, each being slightly different version. Usually the Brown was the default, Green was transparent, Red was fast and Grey was strong.

Suppose this new video shows some gameplay better than the first video:

I also experimented on highres sprites.. they were a bit buggy though. Don't know if the sprites need that many frames either. The sprite pack for this one monster take 23MB, but the model + one texture just a bit over 1MB. Lowres sprites were only 345KB...

Yea, I didn't do any damage textures or gib models yet. I do plan to make some later. I'd like to have gib models for most monsters, even the stronger ones, but then that would need some changes in the logic when monsters are gibbed...

I plan to change the monster sounds too, so that each has their unique sounds, probably also do more than one sound for See, Active, etc.. so that they could be randomized, if Doomsday ever supports that for any sounds.

Note that I had the Berserk in this video. I'll probably adjust the Lance attack speed when I make the other melee weapon. I had thought it should be about as effective as the Gauntlet in Quake3.. and the other melee weapon should be more effective.

Don't know yet how Berserk will change their effectiveness, I have thought that both weapons could use it, and it is possible that the other melee weapon would completely replace the first one, but then I would give that weapon somewhere half way through the game.

Well, this project has changed quite a bit. Not going to be just some model replacement thing. Plan is to have it as a new game for the Doomsday Engine.

Also it's going to need a new name, so the current name is just temporary until I think of something more fitting. Name suggestions are also welcome.

Often I've been thinking of having some more retro style graphics. So, I decided to make a small prototype level with that style, to see if I like it and have fun creating it. Turns out I liked it and had more fun. I think I will continue with this style.

I gotta admit I wasn't sold on this overall until I saw the video here. I thought the textures looked a little flat and the monsters looked too 'metallic', based on the screens I had seen in the 'post your pics' thread.

But now, having seen everything 'in motion' and more in a proper context, now I think the project looks really strong. The monsters remind me of stone golems or something like that. They don't make great imps, but as standalone monsters they are actually pretty damn good. And the textures really do create a strong sense of place and mood.

Also the ambient sound effects and music are really atmospheric and spooky. Perhaps a bit too 'reverby', but otherwise pretty good.

Yea, it's good to see things in action for a change. Unfortunately now I only have one image that is not even ingame!

Recently I've been working on a player character and also experimenting a bit on what kind of retro graphic style I want to do, and how should I do it. Like should I draw straight with the palette or just convert true color images into the palette? And should I do rounder/more complex models or simple blocky models?

Are you going to increase the default view height for the player? As it stands he seems too short compared to the enemies and when wielding the sword it looks rather too big for him (it would get stuck in the ground if he swung it like that).

Yes, I should increase the view height, no wonder those red monster versions felt so tall... I've probably forgot to increase it when my config was reset some time ago.

The sword is meant to be big. It's inspired of manga/anime with oversized swords. And yea, there's two swings per attack. That should probably change, so that different swings are alternated or maybe have the sword controls a bit like in some fighting games. Press different direction keys and then there will be different attacks. Perhaps also a possibility for blocking some incoming attacks.

I've also thought that the big sword couldn't be used in too small spaces, or it would hit the walls/etc and the attack would then fail.

So far I've not done any new game code stuff. I want to get some more model/texture/audio content done before I take a look into that.

I recorded some new video of the player character. Also the modeling style has changed a bit. I thought to make it a bit more abstract and simple. The level textures should change.. the youtube video filtering kinda shows what I've thought for them to be.

The new video shows the player character running around and using some weapons against some player dummies. The weapons are the starting weapons: Swords and Gun, and the ultimate weapon: Plasma Storm Cannon. It will still need some actual attack animations.

It also shows some jumping. There could be a small and big jump. The gravity could also be lowered, so player could float around for a while. Player will have lots of air control, the big jump would be sort of half flying then.

The current death animation could be the normal death animation or the gib death animation. If it's the normal death animation, then the gib death could destroy it more completely.

No game sounds in the video, but player character could sound like some of the sounds in the background music.

(new flash player seems choppy, and old one warns about vulnerability.. uhh.. hope the videos work fine for you...)

The sprites aren't exactly animated, they just have Alive, Death and Gib frames on all angles. I don't think it's really necessary to have much animation. If you have time to look at them if their arms or legs move, then the game is too easy. In the videos I was playing at the currently hardest difficulty (maybe the double ammo doesn't fit there anymore?).

About the difficulty levels... at the moment they change enemy movement & missile speeds, and how often the enemies attack. I was thinking every setting could be adjusted/customized separately from each other. I guess there could be some presets too.

The jumping/flying could be limited a bit, so there would be some stamina/energy for it, or be like the special powers in Abuse: only have 1 at a time, use as much as you like, level change remove it. So there could be some other powers too.

It's using a custom version of Chocolate Doom. At the moment my code changes are bit messy/experimental, and is partially using Dehacked, but maybe that part is totally unnecessary. I had thought of adding some other than gameplay changes too, but I understand nothing about the rendering parts of the code...

Also I think I won't try to sell this anymore if I ever get this complete. So maybe I'll put together some playable demo sometime soon.

The designs of the sprites look pretty good, but the shotgun looks like it's pointing up into the sky at that angle. Then again, that's the same angle that most Doom weapons point at so eh. Also looks a bit under detailed in comparison to the surroundings.

Thanks! I was thinking I'd redo the shotgun a bit. The other weapon looked much better. The shotgun was a bit of a quick test on drawing a first person weapon sprite. The other weapon was initially inteded to be the starting weapon, but then it also started to look a bit like a rocket launcher.

The rockets used the same sprites as the grenades shot by the enemies, but they should be different sprites/objects. Player could have a grenade launcher too. Don't know how well that would work with the vertical autoaim. It would probably use the same logic as the enemies.. and sometimes they shoot the grenades to the ceiling if player is far away and the ceiling is low. Maybe it could be useful in some places anyway.